I published my first book with them in 2021. All team members were very accessible and responsive. My editor was so exact as were the design team. I ended up with the beautiful book that I had dreamed of. High quality paper and cover design. It did NOT look like a self-published book. Their marketing team created a functional and professional website. Their distribution team was so helpful getting the book to a variety of retail channels. I continue to get sales reports from them. Writing my second book now and looking forward to working with Mascot once again. read more

Mascot Books helped me print 1,000+ copies of my children's book. They walked me through the process, helped me understand what the printer required, and made sure everything was taken care of. There's no better feeling than when a semi-truck pulls up to your house in your tiny subdivision and unloads a pallet full of books. I highly recommend Mascot Books if you're looking for excellent service and for help creating something that will stand the rest of time. read more

Mascot Books - Bookstores Near Me - Herndon, Virginia

I ordered two books from them over two weeks ago and other than the initial email with an order number, I have heard nothing back and can't get a hold of them. I googled if they are a scam but it seems to be a mixed bag. Do they take payment then not send books? read more

I wanted to wait until my book was published so I could be so elated that I would forget what a horrible experience this has been. When I saw the recent flurry of positive reviews on google, mostly from children's book authors, I decided the time was right to share my experience. I assumed I was paying for expert publishing services to publish my memoir "Forward from the Sea; Journey of a Black Woman Oceanographer and Engineer". If this were my business, the level of service I received from the production editor would be unacceptable. After several iterations of cover designs, I ended up contracting someone else to do the cover design. I presented a full manuscript in December. By April, I had to solicit someone else to manage the efforts of Mascot's production editor. We had to give him deadlines and hold him accountable. It is June and we could still be months away from a published book. This has been a very disappointing experience, something that I would NOT tolerate in my own professional experience. I would be happy to share my experience with anyone thinking about doing business with Mascot. I am on all social media platforms. read more

I stumbled across Mascot Books by chance while reading a book to my kids that one of my mother's friends had published with them. And it turned out they were fairly local to me, so I reached out with some draft text and artwork and heard back almost immediately. Now I'm on my 4th kids book with Mascot and working with Ben Simpson and Lauren Magnussen has been very smooth and easy each time. The products are top quality and a very worthwhile return on investment for this full-service hybrid publishing house. I highly recommend Ben, Lauren, and the rest of the Mascot team to anyone with an idea and goal of being a published author and/or illustrator. read more

Mascot Books - Bookstores Near Me - Herndon, Virginia

We published our first children's book with Mascot. This happened during the early days of the pandemic, so some of what transpired may be related to that situation. The quality of the book is excellent and the illustrations came out beautifully. We were very happy with the end product. The next phase of marketing, however , was very uneven - we experienced a lot of turnover throughout the organization and were very disappointed with the Marketing plus program during the initial post publication time period. We basically built all of our websites and social media sites and directly marketed the book to a number of independent bookstores. For the Marketing plus, we received two book reviews from Mascot contacts who are bloggers. At this point, we felt the significant investment was not worthwhile. We were then assigned a new marketing associate named Sky who really engaged and took action supporting our marketing efforts. We were extremely pleased with her work including the Amazon sponsored ads as well as the help in getting our story in the Cape Gazette. Sky made a huge difference. Overall, we were satisfied with the key aspects of Mascot's publishing and would recommend for first time publishers. If you are savvy in Marketing and social media, I would recommend doing that yourself and foregoing the marketing plus investment. read more

I had a decent experience self-publishing a series of four children's books with another company, but a friend told me how pleased she was with Mascot's professional handling of a couple books she wrote. Mascot gave me a better price on the books and services, so I decided to give them a try even though the style and subject matter of my fifth book was entirely different from the series. I was able to peruse the work of a variety of artists, one of whom ultimately created amazing, detailed illustrations for my "After the Ark" book. When I went into self-publishing I had no expectations. It's been a continuous learning curve, and I only have a "mom and pop" budget. Yes, I had one major set back that wasn't Mascot's fault. It involved the first illustrator going AWOL. Still, I found if you keep up with your end of the process and communicate with the editors, stylers, coordinators and illustrators, you will arrive like I did, at a lovely finished product. I doubt I will ever make my children's books pay for themselves, but I am leaving a legacy for my grandchildren, family and friends who enjoy the musings I put to pen and picture. I will definitely continue to use Mascot for any future books. read more

Terrible experiences from the start. I would not choose them or any other their other business names: Mascot Books, Mascot Kids, or Amplify. They just want your money and not what's best for you. read more

I've worked closely with Mascot Books for four years on eight different children's book projects. I highly recommend them. As a new author, I didn't know where to begin. From editing my manuscript, to helping with illustrations, to producing a book that I'm proud of, they've proven invaluable. And when things didn't go exactly as planned, I felt I had a partner that really cared about me and my project. You should know that marketing and distribution isn't easy, and you as the author will have to be involved in that effort. There is no way I could have done this without Mascot's expertise, and for that, I am grateful. read more

Mascot Books - Marnie - Author with my MASCOT books - Bookstores Near Me - Herndon, Virginia

I spend over 4000 dollars with Mascot Books and they still wanted more money. Very very bad experience. Once they get your money they don't help you market your book. Their contracts are misleading. They quote you prices at around 2000 dollars and they end up charging you over 4000. You take all the risk and they get your money. My book sales were horrible because of them. I had to do all the marketing myself. They even charge you storage fees to keep your books. This is not listed in the contract. Big big Rip off! read more

marketing was terrible from the beginning. the book looked good. I think they really make money from collecting fees from authors to keep distributing their books. there has to a better place /and price then this. read more

I was looking for a publisher and came across Mascot Books. That was a lucky day for me. I have published three children's books with Mascot, and each one has turned out better than I could have hoped,. This in large part because of the wonderful illustrator, Stephanie Fliss-Dumas, with whom Mascot put me in touch. The staff at Mascot has uniformly been excellent, on top of things, and very pleasant and professional to work with. The cost of storing and shipping books and the very reduced rate at which Amazon obtains stock from Mascot prevents me from awarding this publisher five stars. However, in all other aspects, partnering with Mascot is a good idea for anyone wishing to get his or her work published in a quality, professional manner. I encourage a writer looking to publish a children's book to peruse the Mascot Books website. read more

They are the worst publisher I have worked with. I would avoid them at all costs. As a writer, I thought that perhaps the warnings for vanity publishers like this one might be exaggerated but they aren't. It felt like being robbed and they continue demanding more money and holding royalties. Take the tine to find a traditional publisher. It is worth it. read more

Mascot Books charged high fees. They didn't live up to their end of the contract. My book was supposed to come out in 9 months and it took them over a year to release it. They didn't promote my book or tell me when it was live on their site. Heck, my book was printed incorrectly as well, which they tried to talk their way out of liability. Their design. Their issue. Their communication skills are atrocious. I regret signing with them. They were nice at the beginning, that is until I signed the contract. Then, things went downhill fast from there. read more

I had my children's book published through Mascot Books. They did a great job with the finished product. However, their fees are much too expensive, your book doesn't really get off the ground despite their minimal efforts to assist you with marketing. The big huge expense, is the storage costs to keep the books housed in their storage facility. If I had to do it over again I would have shopped around a bit more for a better value or just been more patient with traditional publishing. This company is much too expensive. You pay out more money than what you receive in royalties. Buyer Beware! read more

Horrible experience and they are very unprofessional. I submitted a proposal and they seemed interested. They wanted to set up a time with me to talk about my book. Then it went down hill from there. They asked me a time, I gave them one. They said that will not work so they game me a time and I agreed. Then they emailed me saying they had to reschedule, so I rescheduled and they did not keep that time either. So I emailed again setting up a time, once again it was not kept. After trying to set a time to talk about the book for about two months I finally emailed them how much it was going to cost. They emailed me a week later saying it is hard to give estimates unless we discuss about it...which I was trying to do the whole time. Oh well, during this whole fiasco I was doing research on this company and they seem to be nothing but a VANITY PRESS. Avoid them if you can because they are very unprofessional and after digging deeper in the internet about them they will charge you around $5,000 and you will get a return of a fraction of that, thus they are a vanity press because they do not seem to vet anything and will publish just about anything as long as you have the money for it. Highly recommend to try to do a traditional publisher or just do Draft 2 Digital or Amazon Direct Publishing, both of these places are free. In the end, the publisher should be paying YOU not you paying THEM. Maybe if they held up their schedule, I would of given more stars, but if this is how they are just with a proposal, then avoid them at all costs...quite literally. read more

I would be mad if I were an author who is using this company to publish and sell their book. They are doing you a great disservice by not responding to emails. I am a customer who needed to order quite a few of a certain book. I emailed several times with only one response. Would not respond to my other emails. Why in the world would you have a online bookstore and not respond? Extremely poor way of running a company. You have made this author miss a nice amount of sales. I would be questioning this company authors. Loss of sales for you and I had to scramble to find another book. Hopefully Amazon will get it soon and I can use it for next time. Sorry read more

I published my first illustrated book, For the Love of Laxmi with Mascot Books, on February 1, 2022. We started working together on the book in June 2021 - I had already worked with an illustrator to get the designs done on my own, so I didn't end up using their design services, so I cannot entirely comment on that. I worked with Mascot on their publishing, distribution, and marketing options, and I admire them and their work. This was my first book ever, so I had a lot of anxiety about timing, quality, and ensuring we would have a good go-to-market strategy. I initially micromanaged with a million questions, which their team handled so gracefully. I do wish their team provided frequent communications and more face to face/zoom time to help reassure, but outside of that, they were always on top of things behind the scene - the book quality was stunning, the distribution was outstanding, and truly resulted in a great first release. I can't wait to work with them on the other project. read more

I was just reading the reviews at the bottom, and my wife and I went through all the troubles these other authors went through and more. My wife wrote a children's book, There Was an Old Lady Who Swallowed a College with the help of my son who was in kindergarten at the time. It was a project done for his class which that is another story in itself. Mascot Books was very eager to publish the book. They told us all the front costs that we had to pay which was around $8000 by the time we were through from paying an illustrator to everything else Mascot was charging us. USC, the university my wife wrote about, even approached Mascot saying they wanted to license the book. This was the nail in the coffin. Basically, USC had all the rights to the book and only could sell it in their campus bookstore. Who buys children's books in a university books store, not college students. Like one of the other clients said, "There was no marketing from Mascot." We had to do it all on our own. I even went to the Rose Bowl during a UCLA/USC game to see if I could sell them on my own which was embarrassing. But, I sold more books than Mascot did. They charged us each time to ship their books to us from their storage facility. After 6 months of the book not selling, we begged Mascot to allow Amazon to sell the books. It was supposed to be in Barnes and Noble, Amazon, and other bookstores across the nation initially. Eventually, Amazon sold what they ordered, but we had to donate all my wife's books from Mascot's storage facility because they were charging us $300 a year to store them. We couldn't afford the book anymore. Sadly, my wife had ideas to write a children's book like this for all the universities across the nation. Obviously, we felt duped! Look somewhere else if you want to start your career in children's books. read more

Don't use this publisher! They scammed me by telling me my books would sell over 1000 copies this first month. Their director lied to me the entire time during the contract process. The production team is rude as well! They are cheap, you get what you pay for I guess! read more